(continued...)
The lessons Ron taught to those first landlubbers were never forgotten, as one student recalled. He was at the Enchanter’s helm one dark and turbulent night, and had to brace himself by gripping the spokes of the wheel as he fought to keep her on a profitable course. The yacht was pitching and yawing badly as she made way through the towering swells under a dark and cloud-torn sky.
The storm raged and the seas heaved the boat in opposition to the helm. Like a drunkard, Enchanter, blown about by wind and seas, staggered over another great swell. The helmsman searched his mind for the correct sailing technology to apply, and remembered Ron’s words: "She almost stops in head seas; she rolls her rigging loose when too near the trough."
He eyed the top of the mainmast. It lurched in the blackness, and he recalled how Ron had once taken the wheel, finding a safe and profitable course against an angry sea.
"Enchanter behaves well in the ocean only when proceeding on courses which give her minimum roll and pitch," the sailor recalled Ron saying. "When she begins to ’knife sideways,’ cutting her bow into the sea sideways as she rolls, she is a bit too far toward the trough."
"Ron wrote a complete set of instructions
on the sailing and care of yachts
during his time aboard the Enchanter.
His work is a legacy of seamanship..."
As the words came back to him, the sailor brought the helm over gently, anticipating the sea the way Ron had shown him. Enchanter smoothed noticeably. A glance skyward and the once-lurching mast was now tracing circles against the clouds. She was back on a profitable and comfortable course.
As with this mariner, the others who trained aboard the Enchanter also knew the value of doing things right, and all became well-versed through Ron’s training in the laws of the sea.
Although the Enchanter (rechristened the Diana in 1968) was retired from Ron’s service in the early 1970’s, and passed into other hands, her association with the Sea Organization as the vessel used to train the first members was not forgotten. In this tradition, she was sought and found and acquired again by the Sea Organization.
In 1989 a project to restore the Diana began. The extensive refitting was performed under the direction of Sea Organization veterans, who upgraded her to full professional standards. Using compilations of Ron’s nautical experience and his precise writings on how to sail the Diana, she was returned to service in 1991 as a training vessel for the crew of the new 440-foot Sea Org Motor Vessel, Freewinds®. Today, the Diana proudly carries the Sea Organization flag, continuing her tradition as a training ship for able-bodied seamen and new Sea Organization members alike.
And those who sail upon her today, when guiding her bow delicately through ocean swells or hoisting her sails to greet a fresh breeze, do so with the same precision and respect for Old Man Sea that Ron had taught their predecessors.
